Chicago: starting at the center

On my first full day in Chicago, Taylor and I attended a tour of Millennium Park that was part of a weekend of tours of the city's designed landscapes organized by the Cultural Landscape Foundation. The Millennium Park tour was led by Ed Uhlir who directed the entire design of the park-- an amazing opportunity to hear his unique perspective on what has become an incredibly vibrant public space for Chicago. It was pretty much a private tour-- there were only four of us-- so Mr. Uhlir drove us around on a golf cart! The park is comprised of several areas designed by different landscape architects (Gustafson Guthrie Nichol), architects (Frank Gehry), and artists (Anish Kapoor and Jaume Plensa), each of which is highly successful in shaping a striking and active public space. We heard about how some elements of the original designs caused problems that Mr. Uhlir has had to fix, like the gravel sloped walkways in the Lurie Garden from which the gravel slid off; he replaced these with a paving made of recycled counter-tops.




The Crown Fountain




Cloud Gate


I noticed how many people were experiencing these spaces through photography and video-recording. Perhaps this is partly due to the high volume of tourists this time of year, but I think it also speaks to the way people experience public space today. The Crown Fountain, with it's gigantic digital faces of Chicagoans that intermittently spew water and shallow central pool, and Cloud Gate, with its shiny surface that reflects the city and visitors, both create a kind of stage in the city. These are places where city dwellers can see themselves and see each other, and watch a public spectacle that stars themselves. While sitting on the edge of Crown Fountain, we saw a skimboarder take a daring pass through the pool, be reprimanded by a security official, and then try to get the crowd behind him as he defied the rules and went for a second pass. We also saw a wedding party (having their photos taken, of course); the bride then waded in and encountered a little boy who had been shuffling through the fountain for awhile already. They approached each other tentatively as the crowd watched, just for a moment, before the boy shuffled off in his own direction again.